Portion Distortion and the Last Supper

Brian and Craig Wansink teamed up to analyze the amount of food depicted in 52 of the best-known paintings of the Last Supper. After indexing the sizes of the foods by the sizes of the average disciples head, they found that portion size, plate size, and bread size increased dramatically over the last one thousand years. Overall, the main courses depicted in the paintings grew by 69%, plate size by 66%, and bread size by 23%.

The studys findings will be published in the April 2010 issue of the International Journal of Obesity and released in the online version of the journal on Tuesday, March 23.

I think people assume that increased serving sizes, or portion distortion, is a recent phenomenon, said Brian Wansink, professor and director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab. But this research indicates that its a general trend for at least the last millennium.